834 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXX. IS o. 780 



orderly simplicity of his daily life to be dis- 

 turbed by outside influences. Goethe's words 

 emphasizing the necessity of plain living as 

 essential to high thinking were constantly on 

 his lips, and he furnished an excellent ex- 

 ample of the simple life so often the subject 

 of sermons, and so rarely practised. 



Apart from his remarkable personality, 

 there is a reason why Dohrn's life should be 

 of particular interest to Americans, and that 

 is the influence he exerted upon men who were 

 actively identified with all progressive move- 

 ments in institutions of learning. Shortly be- 

 fore his death the writer had the privilege of 

 ■spending some time in the company of the 

 ^ate Mr. Daniel C. Gilman during his visit to 

 the Naples Aquarium, and it was extremely 

 interesting to notice the keen and appreciative 

 interest he took in the work of the investiga- 

 tors then engaged in carrying on their studies 

 in the laboratories. " Dohrn," he said, " was 

 one of the first men whose advice I sought for 

 on being elected to the presidency of the 

 Johns Hopkins University, and when I asked 

 him what he considered to be the really es- 

 sential principle to be kept constantly in 

 view in outlining- the policy of a new univer- 

 sity, he replied : ' Liberty ! Liberty ! Liberty ! ' 

 and added : ' First get the best available men 

 as professors, and do not spend too much 

 money on buildings.' " The advice was not 

 disregarded, for not only were the buildings 

 of the Johns Hopkins University character- 

 ized by great simplicity in structure, but the 

 motto selected for the university was " Veritas 

 vos liherahit." Dohrn's guiding principle in 

 establishing the aquarium was to gather about 

 him a body of investigators, and then to en- 

 large the institution so as best to meet the 

 needs of these workers. 



Many Americans carried away from Naples 

 pleasant memories of a day spent on the Jo- 

 hannes Muller, the small steamer which made 

 frequent excursions to diiierent points about 

 the Bay of Naples, either to collect specimens 

 for exhibition in the aquarium, or for study by 

 those engaged in scientific investigations. 

 One of the most interesting features of these 

 trips was the opportunity of listening to the 



story of the founding and development of the 

 zoological station as it was told with almost 

 boyish enthusiasm by Dohrn. 



Scientist by profession, he had many of the 

 temperamental qualities of the artist. H he 

 had not possessed this rare combination of 

 mental traits, his friend Joachim would not 

 have put Dohrn's favorite Neapolitan " Fish- 

 erman's Song " to music and sent the score to 

 Oxford, to be played at the ceremonies attend- 

 ing the conferring of an honorary degree upon 

 his friend by the English university; nor 

 would Hans v. Maree have asked to be al- 

 lowed to decorate the walls of the library in 

 the aquarium with a series of frescoes, which 

 are considered by art critics to represent the 

 best work of that artist. 



Dohrn firmly believed in the unity of all 

 forms of knowledge. He contended that men 

 should not be classified arbitrarily as " scien- 

 tists," " artists " or " litterateurs " ; as indi- 

 vidually they possessed but in varying de- 

 grees the temperamental qualities common to 

 all. To lay stress upon these artificial divi- 

 sions was to return in spirit to the period 

 when classification and systematization were 

 considered of more value than the actual 

 study of vital facts. 



Discussions as to the relative merits of sci- 

 ence, art or literature failed to interest him, 

 for he felt deeply that life in its broadest 

 sense was for each individual the chief inter- 

 est; the only essential difference was discov- 

 erable not in the object, but in the angle of 

 vision of the observer. 



His taste in literature and art was dis- 

 tinctly classical. Cicero, Horace, Shake- 

 speare and Goethe were his favorite authors, 

 selections from Beethoven, or Mendelssohn 

 and Brahms the music he enjoyed the most. 

 In pictorial art, color appealed to him more 

 than form. Perhaps in this he had been influ- 

 enced by his friend Bocklin. The whole 

 scheme of organization of the aquarium re- 

 vealed the broad sympathies of the man. 



One of the chief reasons assigned for the 

 selection of Naples in 1872 as the best place 

 in which to place the station was the beauty 

 and historical associations of the city and its 



